The Heart of the Matter
by whatifqueen
Summary: The queen has a job for her. Belle has other plans. A gilded cage, an unlikely friendship with a fellow captive, and secrets abound. Rumbelle overtones.
1. Act 1

**Summary: **The queen has a job for her. Belle has other plans. (Rumbelle. Sure to be AU by the time season 2 hits)

—

**The Heart of the Matter**

**Or**

**The Play's The Thing **

—

The last thing Belle expects is to be face-to-face with a loaded crossbow.

There's an easy familiarity between the man and his weapon that keeps her from dashing into the green foliage; as good as she's gotten hiking trails all over the countryside the past few weeks, she knows that she would be dead before she took two steps. What remains to be seen is if he'll pull the trigger anyway if she doesn't.

"What are you doing in these woods?" the man asks. "Don't you know they belong to the queen?"

The words echo in her head from that fateful night, spat at her with a bitterness she hadn't thought possible: _Your friend, the queen. _That, more than the bow, keeps her where she is.

"Let me guess," she says, swallowing the lump in her throat. "Woman in black, red streak in her hair?"

There's something wrong with his gaze: Instead of looking her in the eye, his eyes are focused on a spot right between her eyes. _That's where he intends to put the bolt, _she realizes. "It's purple now," he confirms.

And suddenly, the paranoia Rumpelstiltskin had displayed in the wake of their kiss seems far more real than it has any right to be. Certainly nowhere near as baseless, if this man in her employ was anything to go by; less of an excuse than Belle had originally believed.

In that moment, all she wants is to be far away from this place. Her heart flutters inside her rib cage like a trapped bird, slamming against her chest in an effort to escape its confinement even if she can't. Then, pulling her dignity around her like armor and tilting her chin upwards, she looks the man directly in the eye: "I want to see her."

For a second she thinks she can see some sort of emotion flicker across his face, but it's gone before she can name it for what it is. "It would have been kinder to have killed you," he mutters, gesturing for her to go before him with his free hand.

Not with his weapon, she notes. For all his apparent confidence in his abilities, he doesn't let his obvious upper hand blind him to the possibility of her using it to get the better of him. There's something about that demeanor of his that tells her he's no soldier; something not so rigid, but no less defined. Still, that makes him no less dangerous. Quite the contrary: It's a kind of dangerous that she has no experience with.

This is a man who knows how to watch and wait. He won't drop his guard because she's a woman, something most of the soldiers she's known don't see fit to learn. And she should know: She's been around enough of them during the war to know otherwise. This is, unless they knew dangerous women personally.

Like the queen, if she was indeed as terrible as implied.

"What have you brought me, my huntsman?" a familiar voice calls out from the main path, and any remaining doubts that the queen and the woman she had walked with might not be the same person were wiped clean away.

The tip of the arrow presses into her back; it takes a moment for Belle to realize that she had stopped walking.

As they move into the queen's line of sight, Belle finds her courage starting to fade. "A girl. I know you, don't I?" the queen says, pressing forward before Belle can get a word in edgewise. "Yes, we met on the road some time back. Whatever are you doing here? I would have thought you'd be off with your former master in some sort of lovers retreat. You simply must tell me everything."

Belle doesn't know what it is about her – the sheer force of her personality or perhaps the look of dramatic beauty she has so carefully cultivated about herself – but she finds herself wanting to curtsey to the other woman. Or, far more likely, the remnants of a lifetime's worth of training in royal protocol. And while the daughter of a vassal lord knows her courtesies, it's sheer force of habit from her time with Rumpelstiltskin that keeps her from doing so in a timely manner.

Unlike the exaggerated curtsey she had given when presented with a rose to match Rumpelstiltskin's own exaggerated bow. Partly mockery of courtly conventions, partly the sweetness of a would-be lover playing at storybook ideals for his lady, the boyish attempt had a charm that she had responded to with an eagerness of her own. None of that was here with the queen to tempt her back into such behaviors.

And, just like the last time they met, she secretly enjoys the freedom that comes with flouting the rules. Besides, it's not as if this particular queen has any idea who she really is, dressed as she is in a simple blue dress and white blouse – the clothing a girl might wear from any number of villages. An ordinary girl who wouldn't know how to curtsey, let alone when to.

No, in that illusion she feels certain she is safe, and little else. Instinct tells her to get out, get away, but experience tells her that she needs to do so delicately. With finesse, not blunt force. Something had to be said; but what?

"I wouldn't know where to begin," Belle confesses. That at least had the ring of truth to it.

"Did it work?"

"Did what work?"

"True love's kiss," the queen replies with a forced lightness that sets her on edge. It's too artificial to sound like anything but prepared and practiced speech to her ears.

Exactly who was this queen and what was her connection to Rumpelstiltskin? Belle had never gotten anything more than vague hints as he was screaming about betrayal. It was the missing piece of the puzzle that left her floundering in their respective wakes, making the best of the situations as she could.

There's no need for loyalty now that she's been released from her deal, there never was one now that she thinks of it, but… Even angry at him, even heartbroken over his treatment and dismissal of her, she never wants to hurt him. And the queen's eagerness makes her all too wary.

"…No," she lies, shifting her weight from one foot to the other to get a better sense of balance on the uneven path. "I'm really not comfortable with this conversation. It's…it's still fresh to me."

"You poor thing. You must be positively heartbroken. It's such a burden having a heart, isn't it?" the queen says, throwing a gleeful look over Belle's shoulder at the huntsman.

Whatever game they were playing amongst themselves, the huntsman doesn't rise to the bait; instead, he scans the forest – for prey or more trespassers, she had no idea.

"Join me," the woman in black says, linking an arm through Belle's. "There's nothing quite like watching a master at work; it'll be just the thing to take your mind off your troubles. Huntsman, find us something impressive for you to take down."

They follow the huntsman at a distance. Belle can't help wondering if the two of them even need to be here for this woman to put on her show. That's all it was: a carefully crafted play where only one of the actors knew their lines.

"Quite the view, isn't it?" she says. It takes Belle a moment to realize that the queen wasn't talking about the trees, and she lets out a nervous giggle.

It was the same thing last time. Though the partner had made her uncomfortable, the allure of a woman-to-woman conversation had drawn her in. Back at her father's castle, she'd had female friends to talk to about all manner of things. Girl talk had been something she had missed at the Dark Castle, and a void that was all too easy for others to see.

Relaxing a fraction, Belle casts an appreciative glance at the huntsman's leather-clad backside; absurdly, she feels even guiltier than she ever did sneaking peeks at Rumpelstiltskin when he thought she wasn't looking. It had been one of their silly, innocent games, and the mere memory of it causes a pang in her heart. Of all the things to be getting maudlin over…

When the huntsman stops, so do they. Peering out from the woods was a doe staring straight at them. Belle's breath catches in her throat – a deer this close was a novel experience for her. Even before the ogres had come to her land and run rampant, scaring away any game that had survived their assault, hunting had been a luxury only pursued by the men of her class. Somehow, she thinks this woman would have found a way around both those problems if she truly wanted to hunt.

The huntsman lowers his crossbow.

"Kill it," the queen orders. The deer starts at the harsh sound of her voice.

This time Belle knows the expression that crosses his face for what it is: disgust. But he obeys lightning-quick, the bolt in the heart of his target before she can even blink. When it's done, he pads softly to where the body lies and whispers something to it.

"What is he doing?" she finds herself asking before she can think to quiet herself.

"Being weak," the woman replies shortly.

He's praying, Belle realizes; it's something that she would have never thought to connect with the man who had aimed a weapon at her only moments ago. That such respectfulness would come from him, would be mocked by his mistress…

The veil has been ripped away, though it was a flimsy thing to begin with. There's a cloud hanging over her that was even darker than her clothing. Oh, yes, this woman would indeed find a way to be a hunter if she so chose; her weapon just happened to be in the shape of a man instead of a crossbow or a spear. And she has Belle firmly in her sights.

There might have been more of a chance running from the huntsman after all.

"What a fortuitous coincidence that we found each other," the queen mentions, looking down on her from her superior height. "I was just on my way into town, you see, to hire new help. I like to handpick those who will work closest to me."

There's a squelching noise as the huntsman pulls the bolt from the deer. Belle cringes.

"Do put that away, you're frightening the poor thing. Men can be such beasts," the queen adds conspiratorially. "It would be refreshing to have some female company in my home, especially one who knows about the upkeep a large estate takes. What do you say?"

Belle blinks. "I don't understand. You want me to be your caretaker?"

"You do have experience, don't you?" the queen says, crimson lips pulling up into a smile that was no doubt meant to be comforting. Instead, Belle feels like pulling her cloak tighter around herself in order to ward off the cold chill that went down her spine.

"I'm sorry, but I sent word to my father to expect me," Belle interjects hurriedly. "Thank you for the offer, though."

Any pretension of friendliness left the woman's face. "I'm afraid I must insist."


	2. Act 2

**Summary: **The queen has a job for her. Belle has other plans. Rumbelle.

—

The Heart of the Matter

Or

The Play's The Thing

—

The carriage ride was tense, to say the least.

"What was it you saw in him?" the queen asks, leaning forward in her seat. "I suppose he has a certain appeal; power can be quite attractive. But those teeth, that skin. It's positively ghastly. I could hardly imagine wanting to wake up to that face every morning."

The scenery to Belle's right suddenly becomes fascinating. She pays special attention to the condensation creeping along the edges of the windows, following a fat drop as it rolls down the partially obscured glass in a jagged pattern.

The charade was clearly over. It was the most blatant reference to Rumpelstiltskin so far, short of saying his name. She's a little surprised, to be honest – she thought the queen would have drawn it out much longer than that. But the worst part is that she has no idea why.

As the huntsman rides past on his patrol to take a spot at the front – near enough to the other guards that he wouldn't be censured for leaving his post but far enough that he wouldn't have to interact with them – she instinctively averts her gaze. That's when she notices something moving in the trees. And unless slender, patchwork furred bears had taken up residence in the Enchanted Forest, nothing should have been large enough to make the branches shake like that; nothing except a human.

"Look at me," the queen commands.

It takes some effort, but Belle manages to pull her gaze away from the scene unfolding before her. For a moment she considers telling the other woman what she saw, but it passes quickly enough. The teasing queen from earlier is gone; instead, a cold, businesslike mood has settled upon her. No, telling her about possible bandits wouldn't help Belle in any way at this juncture.

"Why are you doing this?" Belle asks.

When the queen speaks she takes care to emphasize every word: "Because he let you go."

"He released you from your contract," she continues, eyes boring into Belle's own. "He let you go free when it would have better served him to kill you where you stand. Why would he do that?"

There's a vulnerability to her in those last few words. Belle's heart goes out to her for a moment – what kind of life had she known if she couldn't make sense out of such an action – but that too is fleeting. Kidnapping is not a deal made willingly between two parties, and whatever pity she feels for this woman matters little in the face of the reality of her crime.

The queen quickly covers for her momentary lapse, masking her face with a confident smirk.

"And not just once but twice. My, my, but you do have a way with him." Her lip curls up in a sneer. "It must be true love."

Belle's heart skips a beat. She should know; it's been pounding away in her ears for some time now and its short absence is quite noticeable.

"But the kiss, it didn't work," Belle says, keeping to her lie as best she can. "It can't be—"

"No matter," the other woman says, leaning back in her seat. "There are things in this world that not even true love can vanquish."

Whatever passes across her face must have signaled something to the queen because it doesn't take long for her to feign shock as theatrically as possible. Her gloved hand goes to her chest and she blinks with wide, innocent eyes. It's a bit more subdued than one of Rumpelstiltskin's responses would have been, but not by much.

"You didn't know? Not that such a development would have been unwelcome – it would have been quite the bonus if it had worked. But it was hardly the point. No, the point was to discover where his weakness lies." The queen looks her up and down, taking the opportunity to size her up – and clearly she is found wanting. "Rather predictable, I must say."

Collateral: That was what the queen wanted. Not information about Rumpelstiltskin or any secrets she might have obtained in her time as caretaker to his estate, but a trump card that could be used to get out of some unfortunate deal. And that made all the difference in the world.

Hostages weren't very useful if they were dead, after all. At the very least it gives her a bit of wiggle room to work with, which was more than she had before.

"You can't wield love like a weapon," Belle says.

"Watch me," the woman retorts. The bitterness was palpable, and the black-clad woman had the look of someone who had swallowed something they didn't much like the taste of. "Love is a weakness; a cruel joke played on its participants."

"No, it's not." Calling on all her noble bearing, Belle holds her head high and looks the other woman straight in the eye; for all that she is practically a vagabond peasant now, they were born equals. "Love is strength. Love keeps us going when all else is lost. It shows us who we truly are. To those willing to let it into their lives, it can make all the difference between surviving and living."

Love could save the last remnants of a village from rampaging hordes of ogres. It could make an ordinary woman brave enough to completely uproot her life in exchange for the continued safety of her family and friends. And it could turn a self-sacrificing existence into a real life. Love made her brave enough to stand before the most powerful of enchantments and _try_, changed her into someone who stopped letting things happen to her and who instead made things happen, and she would carry the memory of that with her for the rest of her days.

"Such faith in him," the queen drawls.

"I believe in love. It may not have worked out for me," – it had failed quite spectacularly, in fact – "but that doesn't make it any less precious."

The queen smiles. "Oh, indeed not. Especially for him, considering what he's done. You should consider yourself lucky that he abandoned you when he did." She leans forward and keeps her voice low, as through intimating a long-kept secret. "You have no idea what he's capable of. His cruelty knows no bounds."

Before Belle can think of an appropriate response to that, let alone say anything, the carriage stops. The queen is forced backward and smacks her head against the back of her seat, though her elaborately coiffed hair remains firmly in place. This pause in the journey, it seems, is not according to plan.

Belle does her level best to keep the hope from her face as the queen opens her door, popping her head out to investigate. "Why have we stopped?"

For once in their short acquaintance, the queen's ever-present focus is directed elsewhere as a guard explains that a fallen tree in the road is blocking their path. A moment is all it takes. Belle rips open the door on her side of the carriage and tears off into the forest.

"After her!" the queen calls out, a note of actual fear in her voice.

The furry figure that Belle saw earlier jumps down from the trees. They catch a glimpse of each other as Belle chances a look back – young, with a curtain of dark curls framing her impossibly fair and strikingly familiar face, the bandit is just as startled by Belle's presence. But that's all it is, a glimpse – Belle has to keep running and the beautiful bandit is intent on her carriage target.

"Hello, _Regina_," are the last words she hears, spat with hate from the mouth of the bandit before all Belle hears is the sound of her own breathing as she races through forest greenery being pushed aside by her own hands.

Then the sounds of magic fill the air.

It's a very distinctive kind of magic – the sound of the forest coming alive and twisting against its natural purpose. The wood creaks and groans as it contorts in ways it was never meant to, screeching like nails against a chalkboard turned to shrieks as if a living being were being tortured.

In that moment, that awful moment, she understands: The queen was no poor, unfortunate soul attempting to break a deal with Rumpelstiltskin in the most desperate way imaginable. No, she was a _rival_. And she was coming for Belle.

Switching up her pattern, she darts into a glade. That detour might buy her a little time, especially if whoever was sent after her expected her to run in a straight line. In spite of living in a war zone before she had gone to work at the Dark Castle, she wasn't used to running for her life. Stone walls and high towers had seen to that. And while the clearing was no high tower to use as a vantage point, it would at least give her better chance to see which direction the magic was approaching from – and a chance to catch her breath – before she had to run again.

Except it wasn't approaching; in fact, from the sound of things it hadn't moved beyond the carriage. _The bandit woman,_ she realizes. The magic wasn't screaming – it was that poor girl being toyed with by the queen.

Screams were something she had far too much knowledge of.

The screams of the soldiers had carried on the wind from the battlefield all the way to her father's castle during the war. Only they hadn't always been soldiers. The townspeople, the farmers – ogres didn't differentiate combatants from non-combatants. But no matter who they were or where they came from, they all screamed the same when the ogres got their hands on them.

The screams had lasted long into the night. Ogres could afford to take their time killing – a few mangled bones here, a torn off limb there, and their opponents were out of the fight. Human biology would take care of the rest. They would scream and in the morning the survivors would pile the bodies on the pyre before disease could fester.

And while she would dearly love to believe that she's mistaken, that it's her mind playing tricks on her in an unfamiliar forest, that it's merely the sounds of animals, she knows better. And even though this might be her only chance at escape, there's only one thing she can do: Turn back and help a fellow captive.

This would be a lot easier to do if there wasn't a large animal breathing heavily to her left. As she turns her head slowly to confirm, she finds the rest of herself going very, very still. This makes no difference to the wolf.

It has two different colored eyes, she notices in an absurd moment of calm. It's almost funny, when she thinks about it – escaping the queen only to die like this. Not what she'd expected. A not small part of her suddenly wishes that she had developed an interest in animals instead of geography during her youth, if only so that she would have a general idea on how to get out of this situation intact.

A high, shrill whistle fills the air, breaking through the calm – and momentarily her eye contact with the creature. Distractions work both ways: Just as she used one to escape the queen, the wolf uses it to run at her, red and black eyes gleaming in the filtering sunlight.

But instead of snapping its powerful jaws around her easily broken skin and bones, it runs past her – toward the sound of magic. As her breath leaves her in a rush of relief, she's left with a single, confusing thought: _Why didn't it kill me?_

Not one to look a gift horse in the mouth, but savvy enough to know that horses and wolves are two entirely different things, she looked behind her to make sure the wolf hadn't changed its mind and come back. It hadn't. Instead, something far worse was waiting for her – the huntsman.

"You'll come with me now," he says.

And with what's left of her dignity, she holds her head up high to walk alongside him in silence. It takes a minute before she realizes it's just that – silence. The battle, such as it was, is over. And there could only be one guess at who the victor was…

"You didn't harm him," he says, interrupting her quiet prayer for the young bandit. Belle looks at him in confusion. "The wolf," he clarifies.

Belle refrains from rolling her eyes. "What should I have done, swung at it—him," she corrects herself automatically; a huntsman would know the appropriate gender, after all, "swung at _him_ with a tree branch?"

"There are those who would. The world of men has no honor; they make sure of that. Wolves kill to survive or to ensure the survival of their pack," he explains matter-of-factly.

"I'm not a man," she tells him.

The huntsman looks at Belle pointedly. "Neither is _she_."

"You didn't harm him either," she mentions quietly, looking upward to watch his face. There was something hidden there, something that explained why he always seemed so uncomfortable around people. At first she thought that it was just her and the queen – one being a prison and the other being his master – but then she noticed the way he isolated himself from the guards they were traveling with. And the way he talked about wolves… "Did you know that wolf? Or were there other wolves that you had encounters with in the past?"

"He's my brother, or as near to one as I have. The wolves raised me," he elaborates. Belle blinks. That actually explained a lot. "They were the ones who taught me what it means to be honorable; it's because of them that I'm able to recognize it when I see it." He gives her a small nod. "You have it. And if you want to survive her, you'd best get rid of it. Play your part and perform to her whims."

"You prayed over that deer. How can you do that and still work for such a person?" Reaching out, she touches his arm to stop him. There's a part of him that still frightens her, but it's lessening the more they talk. He lacks artifice. Besides, she tells herself, she's always been a tactile person. "I've seen the workings of magic before. Is that why you work for her? Does she have some sort of hold over you, some sort of threat?"

The huntsman stares at the spot where her hand rests for a moment before pulling away. "She has my heart."

And that was the greatest mystery of all. How could he love someone like that when he was so obviously disgusted by her actions?

"Then why did you leave her side to come after me?" she asks gently.

"She can take care of herself," he says, pushing aside the greenery to emerge back on the forest path.

The first thing Belle notices is that there's no body. And while it's entirely possible that the queen – _Regina,_ her mind supplies, remembering the last words she had heard from the bandit – could have transformed her into something easily squashed, it didn't seem her style. Not enough suffering involved, if the way she enjoyed tormenting those nearest to her was any indication.

The second thing she notices is that the queen is livid.

"That little viper," the queen hisses to herself, the skirt of her dress twisting dramatically about her as she paced back and forth. The moment she sees them, however, she stalks toward the huntsman and backhands him across the face. He takes it; what else could he do with guards all around them?

The queen is exactly the kind of master that Belle once feared Rumpelstiltskin to be – mercurial and cruel. Belle would back away if she could, anything to get a little space between herself at that scene of violence, but there's nowhere to go. She's trapped.

"It wasn't enough to leave your dear Snow alive; no, now you're sending your little wolf pack to help her attack me. Apparently the mercy I bestowed upon you was too good for you."

And suddenly it clicked. That's where she knew the bandit from – she was the face on a hundred wanted posters spread throughout the kingdom. Snow White: the princess turned fugitive.

The queen turns to the guards. "Chain him up!" Taking his chin in her hand, she forces him to look upon her. "I'll deal with your properly when we get home."

The guards move to restrain the huntsman. Two men stand on either side of him, keeping a firm grip on his arms to keep him from breaking away before the manacles can be placed on him. The fact that they have manacles in the first place sends a shiver up her spine – exactly who were they planning on using them on?

"Wait!" Belle calls out.

The queen shifts her gaze to Belle, focusing her attention on the younger woman; Belle had not missed it in her short time away. The queen raises a single hand to halt the guards in the midst of their duties and Belle can't help but wonder if she's witnessing magic or the sheer power this woman's presence radiates.

"If he's to blame then so am I," she states. _Here goes nothing,_ she thinks. "He's been with me the entire time. How could he send wolves to help that person if he was busy chasing after me? He was following your orders," she reminds her.

"You're a brave one," the queen says approvingly, then gestures to the guards. To Belle, it seemed as if her moods changed with the wind. "Release him."

Belle manages not to sag with relief.

"Your unfortunate choice in lover aside, you've managed well for yourself. Your parent trading your off to men for status and safety…well, it's a hard lot in the life," the queen says, moving over to Belle to place an arm around her as she leads her back to the carriage. "Women like us need to take control of our own lives. It was smart of you to take the opportunity to run when it was presented to you this time."

Belle tries not to shudder away from the physical contact. _Us_, she said as she conflated their experiences into one that would make sense to her world view. Belle was listening. And there, buried deep beneath the pride and affectations she had donned in her role as a witch-queen, was something else: a vulnerability that could be exploited.

Belle looks up at the woman in black. Yes, that could be a weak point, an opening, if she could find a way to use it.

"See that it doesn't happen again," the queen continues, stepping into the carriage with ease.

"Right," Belle says.

A little nervous but growing more confident bit by bit, she climbs in after her. All she had to do was play along long enough to find – _You just want to learn the monster's –_ her weakness. Belle closes her eyes and takes a deep breath.

The pang in her chest doesn't go away.


End file.
